Reviews

With the director of the reigning Finley Award winning production at the helm, and a well-respected cast, Don's Party promised to be worth seeing and it did not disappoint.

From the moment we glimpsed the beautifully recreated late sixties home, beautifully finished with groovy ring of truth detail, and saw Val Riches' gorgeous costumes, you could tell that this was going to be a well-rounded production, that took us back to election night in 1969.

“Never perform with children or animals” is the old adage. Matthew Hustwaite, the 22 year old Producer, obviously has never heard of that.

For his first production for his newly-formed company, Leading Note Theatre, he crammed 50 members of the local choir, dozens of local dancers, and a camel onto the stage.  All were beautifully groomed, choreographed and refrained from spitting.

They won me over by giving me a camel  ride – backstage (I am the agent for The Boy From Oz so I get VIP treatment).

Last Friday night Diamond Valley Singers brushed up their Shakespeare in opening Cole Porter’s Kiss Me, Kateat Warrandyte High School theatre. Though some opening night nerves were evident with some musically sticky spots and a well-covered but undeniably missed entrance, the show proved to be a fun night overall.

Adapting an epic novel into a successful musical is a daunting task. Not impossible as Les Miserables and Man of La Mancha have proved, but getting all of the elements right is not easy. This production of Boris Pasternak’s 1958 sprawling novel set at the time of the Russian Revolution, and about the love affair between the doctor/poet Zhivago and the feisty Lara, has many good things going for it. Firstly the outstanding design by Michael Scott-Mitchell, which captures the sweep and breadth of those turbulent times in simple, clear lines.